


Always Human

by nagi_schwarz



Series: Comment Fic 2016 [58]
Category: Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1
Genre: Carnival AU, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-22
Updated: 2016-08-22
Packaged: 2018-08-10 07:20:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7835368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagi_schwarz/pseuds/nagi_schwarz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the comment_fic prompt: "Any, Any, Carnival AU."</p><p>Rodney the Illuminated Man makes friends with John the Lizard Man.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Always Human

When the last patron exited the gates, Rodney heaved a sigh of relief. Richard, the ringmaster, tugged off his top hat and drew his handkerchief across his brow.  
  
"All right," he said. "Lock it up."  
  
Teyla, Ronon, and the rest of the acrobats set about gathering up their ropes and trapezes, and Markham and Ford and the rest of the clowns helped them lock down the big top.  
  
Evan, who did face painting and miniatures and caricatures for money, was also in charge of the kids who ran the game booths. He supervised them locking up their booths and counting up the cash, using the promise of his homemade stew as a reward for swift work. The children loved him. Rodney was glad he didn't have to spend too much time in the children's company.  
  
He was part of the freak show. Unlike some of the actors in the side show, he was a normal human, but his skill in science and engineering allowed him to be the Illuminated Man, who walked in lightning.in a small caged room (supplied with generators Rodney had built and designed himself). Anne was always cold and miserable after a day in a wet tank as a mermaid. Todd spent hours every night getting out of his pale vampire make-up (his teeth were real, though), that he'd have to spend hours getting back into the next morning.  
  
Rodney let himself out of his cage - he had to be able to get out in case of a technical malfunction - and went to help some of the others out of their cages. He released Todd first, because it took two to help Anne back to her tent while she was still wearing the mermaid tail.  
  
And then, like every night, he went to release John.  
  
John remained huddled in the corner of his glass-walled cell, refused to look at Rodney or even talk to him.  
  
John was a genuine freak, had been sold to Richard when he was a teenager. He was featured as the Lizard Man, because of the blue scales that adorned his skin, his one clawed hand and his yellow eyes, but Zelenka, a zoologist who was a fire eater under the big top, said he thought John's non-human features were more insect than reptile.  
  
"Your door's unlocked," Rodney said, like he did every night. "I hear Evan's making stew, if you're interested."  
  
He knew John had to come out of his cell sometime, because Evan set aside a portion of supper for him every night, and every night it got eaten, but John didn't move.  
  
"Hope your day wasn't too bad," Rodney said, which was stupid, because grubby-fingered children pounding on the glass walls and shouting for The Freak to move was thoroughly unpleasant.   
  
John flicked a glance at Rodney briefly, then looked away again. Rodney wondered if he could talk at all. He drew the curtain around John's cage and turned away, headed for the mess tent.  
  
He ate with Evan, Ronon, and Teyla, listened to their tales of stunts almost gone wrong and ugly people who couldn't handle the truth of their own portraits, and he thought about John. John had been with the carnival since before any of them had arrived. Richard was kind to him, paid him, never let any of the crew speak ill of him, but no one knew anything about him, other than his own parents had sold him and he barely seemed human.  
  
After supper the clowns were in charge of washing up - acrobats the next night, freaks after that, carnies after that - so Rodney went back out to his cage to check on his machines, make sure none of them had been too damaged by inquisitive children whose parents failed to control them. He grabbed his toolbox out of his trailer, changed into work clothes, and set to work.  
  
He was adjusting some wires when he heard...music.

He'd learned to play the piano as a child, been taught at one of the best conservatories in Toronto before his parents decided science was a more worthy career (and before they'd quietly disinherited him when they discovered his preference for the company of men). He appreciated good music.  
  
Whoever was playing the guitar was talented. And his singing voice was lovely.  
  
He wasn't one of the band musicians, though. Rodney knew their voices by heart.  
  
" _If you miss the train I'm on_  
You will know that I am gone  
You can hear the whistle blow  
A hundred miles..."  
  
Rodney set put his wire cutter back into his box and stood up, followed the soft guitar strains. He passed all of the Freak Show cages, passed the game booths and the big top.  
  
And then he saw someone was sitting on the frame of the Ferris wheel, all the way up top. He squinted, but he couldn't make out who it was. So he rolled up his sleeves and started to climb. Everyone pitched in to help put up and pull down the rides, make sure they stayed operational, and Rodney had been working on his physics and engineering degrees before his parents arranged for him to get sent down, so he was pretty much the chief engineer. He'd scaled the Ferris wheel a thousand times over the years.  
  
The further he climbed, the louder and clearer the voice became. This far from the mess tent, Rodney wasn't surprised no one else had heard the music.  
  
He was so surprised at who the musician was that he nearly let go of the handhold he was on.  
  
He started to slide and cried out, and then a hand closed over his wrist.  
  
"I've got you."  
  
It was John. His blue hand circled Rodney's pale wrist, and Rodney flinched, waited for the bite of John's claws, but John's grip was firm and unyielding.  
  
"Got your feet under you?"  
  
Rodney had to force himself to stop gaping, get his feet under him, and then climb the rest of the way to the steel crossbeam John was perched on.  
  
"Thanks," Rodney said.  
  
"Couldn't let you die, could I? Kavanagh would fry himself the second he stepped into your cage if he tried to take your place," John said.  
  
Rodney gaped again. He'd never heard John speak, never thought that John would speak so - normally.  
  
He swallowed. "I heard you playing and singing. You're good."  
  
"Jack lets me borrow his guitar sometimes."  
  
Jack was mime, magician, chief clown.  
  
Rodney studied John. He wore dusty jeans and a flannel shirt, could have been any country farm hand, but for his skin and his eyes.  
  
"Who taught you to play?"  
  
"Jack, a little bit. Cam, a little bit. Vala plays too."  
  
Vala was the sword-swallower and belly-dancer.  
  
"Mostly I just figure things out on my own."  
  
"You've never spoken to me before," Rodney said.  
  
John shrugged one shoulder, kept strumming. "Don't have much to say at the end of a day."  
  
"Why not?"  
  
"I play a role. More animal than human. Animals don't speak. Sometimes it takes a moment, to remember I'm human."  
  
"You're always human," Rodney said.  
  
John studied him for a long moment. "Thank you." He finished the song he was playing with a flourish. "Any requests?"  
  
"You know Dink's Song?"  
  
John laughed softly. "Who doesn't?" And he began to play, and Rodney sang with him.  
  
The next day, after the carnival closed, when Rodney went to unlock John's cage, he brought Jack's guitar with him.


End file.
